Diversity Initiative
Summer 2006
Additional funding from the U.S. Department of State and a donation of the Association of Friends and Sponsors, including the Fulbright Alumni Association, has enabled the Fulbright Commission in 2006 to sponsor 20 students with immigrant background from Germany to participate in 6-week summer institutes at several U.S. universities. The summer institutes had been designed with a specific focus on the needs and interests of the German diversity students and were offered by the University of Alaska at Anchorage (for German student leaders in education), by the University of Nebraska at Omaha and Drexel University in Philadelphia (for young student leaders from several European countries, including Germany). With the financial support from the Association of Friends and Sponsors of the German-American Fulbright Commission a group of 5 diversity students were sponsored for a similar summer program at the California State University at East Bay.
In November 2006, the 20 students convened for an evaluation of their summer school programs at the Fulbright Commission in Berlin. The students reported about the warm welcome and the kind hospitality with which they met at their host institutions, in their U.S. host families, and in the communities. Most of them were extremely pleased with the varied summer school s which included English language improvement as well as segments on American culture and society and academic skills.
The diversity initiative is to be continued through 2007.
